My Secret Self – Book 1

Hello My Fellow Book Dragons, welcome to our Time Travelling day of the week, Throwback Thursday. Our Gem this evening is covered in dust, and we must brush it gently, remove the grains, and expose the black and blue veins that run through this seemingly fragile Opal-like stone. As we brush away the covering we find it is not so fragile and that is has outlasted some rather rough handling, bumps and bruises that have effected both the inside and outside of this one. It took a very long time to mine it. The Miner is Christine U. Cowin, who dug deep and long to find this Gem, to polish it, to bring it forth and to bear it forward that we might observe it in a clearer light.
My Secret Self is book 1 in Christine’s own biography of a journey of self discovery, and her childhood. It is not always easy to read. She was raised in a household where hugs, kisses and cuddles were not easily passed out to little children. Where harsh words and slaps were more likely to be passed out than a lullaby or a gentle touch. Her matriarchal grandmother could have ridden her father like a canoe and paddled him along the lagoon they lived near. To Christine’s mother, her grandmother was more dangerous than anyone of the deadly creatures in the Australian bush, the way she controlled Christine’s father to abuse his own wife.
Christine is brutally honest about all manner of abuse that went on in their home. Not only physical, but mental, verbal, emotional and sexual. It came from every direction. And, as is typical in an abusive environment, everyone abused everyone else at some point. And, just as typical, everyone seemed to get along and show some affection to or with everyone else at some point.
Christine pulls no punches whether talking about her parents, her grandmother, her two siblings or her extended family and how far the cycle stretched. She explains how it effected her personally when it came to her own physical and emotional maturation, her relationships with both the opposite and same sex and her internal struggles to find herself and her place in her corner of the world.
By that same token there is a lot of fun in the book. She describes rural life in Australia in the 1950’s, 60’s and 70’s. Living in the country, caravan vacations, hit music, fashions and all the rest and I thoroughly enjoyed stepping back in time.
I liked this book. I liked it’s honesty and her spirit of perseverance. I could see many beings I have known throughout my long life in the people she described and I liked many of them. This is a book One can relate to. She talks of her Auntys’ and how they effected her life, the seamstress, the career women, the one who wasn’t such a great mother, but was a fun aunt to be around. These women affected her greatly and helped to form who she became. Aunts are often not given credit for the influence they can hold over their nieces and nephews lives. I have a couple I love very dearly and who have influenced me greatly.
I only gave this book 4 Flames for one reason. Christine alludes several times to believing in some form of reincarnation, but never gives much detail. This detracts from the book because it is not very important at this stage as there are two other books in the series. It often distracted me from what I was reading at the time, as it got me thinking about that instead of the issue at hand. And in this book the issues at hand are often extremely important and interesting. She states at the end of this book, in the prologue that more will be explained in the next two books. I believe it would have been better then, to have left mentioning the reincarnation until the second book when she might have gotten into that a bit more. But please do not let this keep you from reading the book. It was a very good read. It is on sale on Amazon now.
Until tomorrow I remain your humble Book Dragon, Drakon T. Longwitten
I received a copy of this book from the author in exchange for an honest review.